THE CONCERT HALL RISING BY THE ELBE RIVER: ELBPHILHARMONIE
The 20th century left a mark in our memories as a time period with the firsts not only in music but also in opera.
With the compositions they produced during the first half of the 20th century, Claude Debussy, Richard Strauss, Alban Berg, Arnold Schoenberg, and Benjamin Britten made history taking the art of opera beyond the limits. During the time between the second half of the 20th century until today, Krzysztof Penderecki's The Devils of Loudun, Philip Glass's Einstein on the Beach, Kaija Saariaho's L'amour de loin, and John Adams's Nixon in China operas enriched the concept of opera and took it to a higher level. Of course, it was not only the content and music of the opera that changed during this period. Many elements of opera from costumes to setting, from plots to the antique languages in which composers chose to write their artwork, changed in this century to a large extent.
It looks like the late 20th century and the beginning of 21st century will leave a mark in our minds as the period in which the architectural masterpiece opera houses and concert halls that reflect the spirit of our age have been designed. Germany's port city Hamburg announces the good news that the music world will embrace a brand new concert hall that will make tremendous impact. Now all the music world is informed that a fabulous concert hall turned from a storehouse will be built in Hamburg, which is the hometown of the world famous NDR Symphony Orchestra. Planned to be opened in 2012, "Elbphilharmonie" is an interesting building with futuristic lines designed by famous Swiss architecture firm Herzog & De Meuron.
You can follow the construction stages of "Elbphilharmonie", which will host North German Radio Symphony Orchestrate (Norddeutsche Rundfunk Sinfonieorchester) centered in Hamburg, whose chief conductor is Christoph von Dohnanyi. The only thing you need to do is visit http://elbphilharmonie-bau.de/ and run the remote-controlled web-cam (you will enjoy your visit even more if you have the latest version of Flash on you computer). Thus, you can have the chance to explore this magnificent concert hall rising by the Elbe River from every angle.
